I got to try a couple new beers from Sierra Nevada tonight. One local bar here does beer tastings on the last wednesday of every month. This tasting was sold out before I could get my ticket, but I went after the tasting and ordered some pints of the two SN beers I wanted to try.
The first I tried was the Brown Saison. I've warmed to saisons lately, and it seemed like the thing I'd be in the mood for. However, this beer was a disappointment. It was much too sweet compared to traditional saisons, and the sweet, syrupy nature drowned out any of the traditional light grassy hopping that might have been hiding behind that. I had trouble finishing a pint. I can only give it
.
The second I had was the Chico Estates IPA. Apparently this bar got the only two kegs of this beer that have ever been sold in the state of New York. This beer delivered. It was a little darker than most IPAs. It was sort of a dark orange color, darker even than, say, the DFH 90 min imperial IPA, but at under 7% ABV, it doesn't really classify as an imperial IPA. The flavor was outstanding. Flavorful but not overpoweringly bitter hops sat on top of a rich, layered malt. It's now after the fact so I can't adequately describe the flavor profile, but there was much more to it than even great IPAs. This is really what I was hoping for from the brown saison: take the hop profile of a good style of beer and put it on a somewhat darker malt. The brown saison failed. This was perfect. It is probably the best standard, non-imperial IPA I've ever tried. I give it
. I was the only one of my friends who ordered this, and when I gave them a sip to try it, they were all jealous. This was by far the best beer any of us ordered that night. This might be a somewhat obscure beer even for people who live in CA, but if you can find it and you like hoppy beer at all, get it.
I also tried a taste of some of my friends beers of which I'll relate impressions but not rate. One was the SN ESB, which was a fairly standard but unexciting ESB about on par with Red Hook. The second was the Lagunitas [Censored] ale. This was a fairly tasty copper-colored ale that wasn't as hoppy as I thought it might be. It was pretty good, but it was a beer my friend had ordered when I ordered the Chico Estates IPA, so I can't say that the [Censored] was all that exciting by comparison.